There Are No Secrets

But There Are Details To Learn…

Watching The Voice and in a couple places, the coaches told an artist to do some little trick or another. Watch having your head up too much, plant your feet to stay grounded, things like that to help in the technique of the song.

It dawned on me that earlier in the evening I had been doing the same thing in some writer’s assignments. Things like watching information flow in descriptions, when to use character descriptions of clothes, when not to use dialog, and so on.

All just techniques that are small and obvious once you understand them, yet as Kris said, each of us need to learn them somewhere along the way.

Sometimes we pick up techniques by reading writers we love and admire. Sometimes we pick them up by trying to figure out what another writer did that worked so well for us. Other times it takes a person farther along the road you want to walk, like the coaches on The Voice, to help you understand a technique.

Or even explain why it works. And when.

An example in a couple of writer’s work tonight is the use of science fiction details. It takes a lot of years and learning techniques to understand when to use and focus on a real detail in sf and when you can get away with a fake detail.

For example, sometimes, in the right context, you can say “space station” and the reader will let you get away with only that description. Other times, you must describe the station through the opinion of the character. It all depends and knowing when to do one and when to do the other is a technique that can be learned to hold readers into your stories.

But get it wrong and editors and readers will go away from your story.

So you have to know and understand that the technique is there, and that’s the hard part, the never-ending learning  part. And it is why Kris and I call so many of our workshops “awareness” workshops.

Let me give you a technique that so many writers don’t seem to know. Big fat paragraphs, monsters, are not welcoming to a reader at the beginning of a story. You want to invite your reader into your story, not block them with a massive hunk of text.

So in the openings of stories, hit the return key a few more times than you think you should need to normally. Your readers will thank you and you might even make more sales.

And thus a simple technique that seems obvious when you understand it.

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INSIDER’S GUIDE Workshops Now Available…

— Insider’s Guide to Selling Short Fiction in 2018/2019 (Starts April 8th)
— Insider’s Guide to Writing Successful Space Opera (Starts April 8th)
— Insider’s Guide to Writing Serial Fiction (2,000 word parts of a novel) (Starts May 6th)
— Insider’s Guide to Writing Detective Fiction. (Starts May 6th)

$300 each, limited to ten writers plus lifetime subscribers. One time workshops. They will not be regular. Sorry. These will fill so don’t wait for the last minute on these. And yes, you can use your credits.

I will be adding these onto Teachable in a week.

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APRIL REGULAR WORKSHOPS…

Sign up directly through Teachable or if you have a credit, write me.

https://wmg-publishing-workshops-and-lectures.teachable.com

Class #37… Apr 3rd … Think Like a Publisher
Class #38… Apr 3rd … Endings
Class #39… Apr 3rd … Point of View
Class #40… Apr 3rd … Writing Mysteries
Class #41… Apr 3rd … Speed
Class #42… Apr 3rd … Teams in Fiction
Class #43… Apr 4th … Depth in Writing
Class #44… Apr 4th … How to Edit Your Own Work
Class #45… Apr 4th … Character Development
Class #46… Apr 4th … Writing Secondary Plot Lines
Class #47… Apr 4th … Advanced Depth
Class #48… Apr 4th … Novel Structure